Sudsy Pudding
by skwirelygurli
Summary: Austin and Ally are just friends. But how does the rest of the world see it? Auslly.


**Sudsy Pudding, an Austin and Ally oneshot**

**I do not own Austin and Ally. For Random Cat and Rach's prompts. Thanks for the reviews!**

Wearing her Halloween costume to school may not have been the brightest idea. The act of wearing the costume, that is. Because in her opinion, her costume is genius.

"I'm an alley cat," she had told them when Trish asked what she was. Whiskers, ears, a tail. She even had taken care to craft a fake fish skeleton, strung around her neck. It reminded her a bit of her outfit from back when she was a part of the Stray Kitties, minus the goth part. And the crazy manager.

Sitting at the lunch table, she regrets not painting the whiskers on. How do cats eat with these things jutting out of their face?

"Boo!" Dez sneaks up on her. It's Halloween, he can't not scare her.

Her pudding splashes onto her fur. Her now matted fur, because no matter how hard she tries, it won't come out.

"Have you tried licking yourself clean?" Trish jokes, and they dissolve into a fit of giggles. They've been poking fun at her costume all day.

"Don't get your whiskers in a twist," Dez adds as she walks away. She needs more napkins, or maybe a new costume. Or new friends. Ones that don't make fun of her.

Ones that she isn't hopelessly in love with.

Make that one. The rest are all platonic. It's that one, the one that's grabbing her arm, leading her outside of the cafeteria. They wind up at the nurse's office. There's no way he could have followed her into the girls' bathroom, or her into the boys'. Not without any repercussions.

The nurse ought to have a larger bathroom.

"Maybe if we try using the hand soap," he suggests, pumping a mountain of it in his palm. He massages it into her chest. Thinking about what he's doing, and how he can never say those words out loud, he looks away. Best to lock the door.

For embarrassment's sake. He's not going to do anything to her in the bathroom. That's skeevy.

"You're just matting the fur." She steps to his right to see past him, into the mirror.

"You're an alley cat. Consider it part of the costume," he shrugs. He wets his hands, tries to remove the soap. No luck.

The nurse knocks on the door. "I have a student that needs to use the bathroom."

Ally checks her sudsy reflection, let's out a sigh. They open the door and a freshman runs in.

After depositing his lunch in the toilet, the last thing he looks is fresh.

The nurse scans her costume, points to the washing machine in the corner. It's usually used for blood and vomit stains, but she can't walk around in a sudsy pudding garb all day.

"I'm not wearing anything underneath this." The outfit is a fitted jumpsuit, an upside to her being a cat, and she couldn't get it zipped with anything bunching up under it. So she went without.

"You can wear your gym clothes." The nurse opens the cupboard to get the detergent out.

"I took them home yesterday. I always wash them at the end of the month." Yesterday had been the last gym class of October. She hadn't planned on bringing them back until class on Monday.

All she had wanted was not to reek of sweat for co-ed volleyball.

Now she's going to reek of soapy pudding all day.

"You can wear mine," Austin offers. Then she'll be dressed, and she won't miss her math class. It's only a short jog across the hall.

The clothes are large, but she ties the pants tight with a shoelace that he's pulled from his gym sneakers. It isn't her best choice of outfit. It will, however, have to do.

Maybe that shoelace should be holding his jaw shut. Ally is in his clothes.

Ally is looking adorably rumpled in his clothes.

This is the wrong place to start fantasizing about his best friend.

Not that he should be fantasizing about his best friend at all.

"You can pick up your clothes later. Now you better get back before the bell rings." The nurse nudges them in the direction of the door, tossing the costume into the washer.

Re-entering the cafeteria, with minutes to spare, they get a few stares. What, no one's seen a cat in gym clothes before?

She pawns a rubber band off the cafeteria monitor to tie her shirt back. It had been holding the asparagus together, and was labeled as such, but she gave up on caring about how she looks back in the nurse's office. The bell rings.

They walk together to class, and there's whispers.

"Why is everyone staring?"

His fake fangs brush against her ear as he does his own whispering. "They think we're together."

Her whiskers twitch as her mouth shapes into an 'o' shape.

If only the rumors were true.

If only it wasn't a giant misunderstanding, leading to the title of 'class couple' weeks later as they cast their ballots for yearbook superlatives.

"There must be some kind of mistake," she tells the activities editor. "We're just friends."

The editor laughs in her face.

Loudly.

"You're kidding." They blankly stare at her.

The sports editor turns away from her computer. "I don't think they're kidding Margo."

"I've heard him call Ally his partner."

"My musical partner," he corrects.

"And science lab," she adds.

Margo sits down on the top of the desk. She sets her binder in her lap, flips through the pages. Licks her finger, another page.

She shakes her head. "It was unanimous. Except for that vote for Shawn and his hand. We had to throw those votes away."

The sports editor snickers.

"Can't you have a re-vote? Or eliminate the category?" Ally pleads, shifting the weight away from Austin. Maybe if she doesn't stand so close to him, they won't get the wrong idea.

"I don't have time for that. Besides, the layout is already done. I just need to get a picture." She trades the binder for her camera, hops off the desk. "Smoosh together."

They enter each others' personal bubble, awkwardly facing the camera.

Margo brings the camera away from her face. "Like you mean it. Act natural."

Knowing they won't get out without playing along, Austin draws her in closer. Big smiles, bigger flash. Her eyes water.

"We good?" he asks.

"You're free to go." She makes a mental note about how he doesn't remove the arm around her waist when they leave. There's no way that they're not going to end up together.

In fact...

The yearbook comes out late April, and they open up to the superlatives page. There they are, right in the center. There's an inset of them from Halloween, him a vampire, her a cat in gym sweats. Both of them are smiling, yet neither aware of the camera. When had it been taken?

Underneath, the caption.

_Most Likely to Pine After Each Other, Austin Moon and Ally Dawson_

"Looks like we're not cutest couple after all," he remarks, rolling his thumb over her hand.

"I guess not."

"We had to submit that page before you two became an item," Margo notes as she passes by with her lunch tray. "We never thought you two would get your act together."

Austin smiles. Neither did he. How was he to know that she'd kiss him for buying her a dozen roses on Valentine's Day? He'd done it to 'support the baseball team.' Dez just had to use those air quotes.

He's glad he did. Buy the flowers, use the air quotes, kiss her back.

Over and over and over.

And over.


End file.
